Just Keep Swimming

Ahh hello everybody, sorry again for another unexpected hiatus. Hard to believe it's August and it's almost already over wah!

Basically what happened was I fell into a depression, one of those that sneak up on you and after a while you get used to it unfortunately. It's sad when you don't realize you're even depressed, it just becomes a black hole of numbness. I unintentionally pushed away many of my friends and family without realizing it. It wasn't until I was in danger of losing my relationship that I finally noticed something is wrong with my current lifestyle and it needs to change. One of those steps is to start posting here again and to be more open about what's going on in my life!

Anyways, I made myself an art schedule but I have a hard time keeping up with it. I focus too much on the short term things that make me happy instead of the long term. I want to work on changing that, especially since I need to get a job. I have no savings right now and it scares me that if something happens to me or my car that I would go into debt. Right now I'm looking for a new day job since my hand is feeling better but eventually I would like to replace that with either a studio job or freelance. I am even thinking about relearning 3D since it would be nice to do something else for a job and still keep my art personal.

In the meantime, I will continue working on my studies and also continue finishing work (still my biggest struggle after all these years!).

Alright, here are some pieces from the past few months, just really experimenting with my process. Next week I'll put aside more time to scan some sketchbook drawings and also some current pieces in progress.

Idyllwild

Time is sure flying by faster than I would like!

Here are some paintings and sketches from my trip to Idyllwild this past weekend. I had a lot of fun!

My first attempts at watercolor painting... I still have a lot to learn, especially how to not make my colors look so pastel and edge control.

Some pen and paper work... I forgot how relaxing hatching can be. 

Sketchy Saturday: Mo' Monsters

Ahh, I'm still addicted to sketching out monster heads. I'm going to start taking some of these guys further, both 2D and 3D mediums!

Here's the start of a collaboration between myself and Juan "Amaakir" Alvarado! 

 Already started sketching out body designs. Juan will 3D model one of these guys and I'll texture him. The other two I'll save for when I get better at 3D modeling!

 In the meantime, here are some life drawing sketches I did at the airport or on the airplane last week.

Here There Be Monster Heads and Rambles

Hello! I apologize for the silence on this blog - it's not intentional!

My wrist and shoulder have been feeling much better, but my attitude and ego have not. It's been a stressful couple of months and these past few weeks have been extra taxing on me due to working so much at my day job (which always makes my hand and shoulders hurt, then makes me mega frustrated and depressed). I'm happy to report that I put in my two weeks notice on Monday and by the end of the month I will be unemployed - but free from the world of retail!
The plan is this: The same week I work my last day at my job is the same week I'll be going out of town to the countryside of Ohio, and I plan on just leaving my laptop at home to get a breather from all my external stresses here and truly relax. When I come back, I want to whip myself and my work into shape. I have a schedule set up where I'll study three hours in the morning and then do four hours of portfolio work. The idea is to have some images to show off at Workshop SF 2012 and hopefully get some pointers on getting some freelance jobs. What happens after the workshop, I haven't a clue, but I just want to keep it like that and adjust when the time comes.

That also means more blog updates! Going to start bringing back Sketchy Saturdays (that does mean more life drawing, I miss my LCAD buds!) and I'm going to begin a new series: WIP Wednesdays where I'll post up any WIPs I have and will allow crits on it. In between those regular updates I will post up any finished images I complete, and will begin to put together a portfolio site (FINALLY).

I welcome any cheers of support and some slaps on the wrist if I stray too far from my goals. I blog because it helps not only let others see my progress or hurdles, but allows me to see how far I've come. And having voids between posts doesn't show much progress.

Okay, without further ado, here's my current sketching binge - MONSTER HEADS!

While visiting Arizona last month, I had the chance to sculpt one of the monsters! I want to do more of these, they're a lot of fun and it's so awesome to be able to hold a monster head in my hand. 

Thanks for reading!

Sketchy Saturday: Shut up and DRAW!

I'm in a little disbelief how much I've fallen out of the swing of things. A little update on my hand is that I have some nerve irritation in my arm and shoulder that causes pain. While it's not as severe as the tendinitis, it still hurts and I will admit that I'm a little over cautious to not draw when I'm in pain. This struggle between my need to draw and my need to rest has gotten me a little down, but I'll continue to do my best to draw while I can.

One of the ways to get back on the horse is to start attending life drawing again. Oh my lands, how out of practice I am. I felt like there was a rock tied onto my hand when drawing, struggling to capture both the pose and the likeness of the model. I could hear the inner-dialogue in my head constantly commenting on either how I need to look more, how I need to redraw something, telling myself I can do - and have done - better, and the occasional off topic thought. I had to tell myself several times "SHUT UP AND DRAW!" instead of constantly berating myself.

Even though I've drawn this model several times before, I can never master her face. Gah!

It's my goal in May to attend life drawing once a week again, along with starting another study schedule to get back into drawing.

As an added offering for not updating my blog as often, here are some monster and demon exploration going on in my sketchbook.

Sketchy Saturday: Slow Down

When this post goes up, I will be wondering the premises of Monsterpalooza! In the meantime, have a quick ramble about my life drawing from the last week.

I've been recovering quite well, mostly by going slow while I'm drawing and learning quite a lot by doing so. Mainly, it's important to do something right instead of doing something fast, which helped me begin to master the ways of the pen. As you should know, pens don't come with an eraser and trying to cover up mistakes will only lead to bigger mistakes. Drawing in pen helps me to select what I feel is important in a pose, and also slows down my mind to really think about what I'm seeing and how I choose to translate it. 

These life drawings are some of my favorites, I can't wait to do more sessions in pen! 

Also as an added bonus, two new trolls! Both are birthday gifts to some wonderful friends. I'm really sad how attached I am to these but am quite glad to see them go to happy owners. I need to draw some for myself next time, hehe.

FDD: 3 & 4

Gah, I forget how busy weekends can be. It's a nice change of pace but I then usually get really anxious to get back to art!

I forgot to post up my piece from yesterday for the daily draw challenge. And today, I really had to rest my wrist so I spent most of it in bed, watching Parks and Recreation. It's feeling better so I did complete a still life study and started a new little piece for my tough girls series.

So, big art post, yay! :D

 My still life was a sandwich! Such a challenging thing to paint but I learned a lot doing it. Unfortunately, it looks better in the picture than it did at the end of this still life... Food tends to go bad. And stink.

Process pics:

Grabbed some boba at the artwalk yesterday, and proceeded to draw people in the area. I love doing this, especially in pen! 

 My next gal, going to attempt to do photoshop this time around. It'll be a fun experience!

30 Day Challenge: Day 6

Somewhat lazy day, I hope you don't mind if I post the studies I did this past week. :D

I have a small notebook that I call my "studybook" so I don't clog my sketchbook too much. The paper is nice for water color as well! Here are some entries:

Top left: "Precision" drawings from life (pencil)
Top right: Gestures from photos (ballpoint)
Bottom left: Value gestures from photos (pencil)
Bottom right: Color face studies (watercolor)

Row 1: Perspective study from life
Row 2: Perspective study from life and value study from life
Row 3: Perspective practice from imagination

30 Day Challenge: Day 2

When I was in school I would often doodle in class, just on a plain sheet of paper with a ballpoint pen. There's something therapeutic about not being able to fix mistakes and to draw my brains out. At least 90% of the drawings were crap, but there are always a few that turn out better than I expect it.

I did have an off day today, just could not get into the grove of things no matter how hard I pushed. I reminded myself that the first rule of art is to relax and have fun. So I picked up a sheet of paper, a ballpoint pen and my neglected brush pen, then just went at it for the next hour to explore some ideas for an upcoming painting.

ROSEY

Here we go, something more along the lines of what I see myself doing for the rest of my life - writing and drawing comics!

Luckily, my friend Paul Richards had put together a comic jam where the attendees had to create a three page comic. Definitely was a learning experience, both on how to tackle something I've been wanting to take seriously for quite some time and also the best way to communicate a story with strictly images!

Here are all three pages for your viewing pleasure: 

More to come, that's for sure! Thanks for your time. 

Commission: Superheroes

Whoa, I didn't mean to leave this blog in the dark with the turn of the new year. Eep!

Here's a project I did recently for a friend of mine for his birthday party invitation. Captain Spank, School Girl, and Miss Undecided are my friends.

And he also wanted a few miscellaneous superheroes to be included.  

Sketchy Saturday

I've been having fun using excess paint and other mediums for my sketches. 

Here's also a WIP for a challenge on CGHub:

When Being Chased By Lions, Let the Hummingbird Guide You

When Being Chased By Lions, Let the Hummingbird Guide You

Acrylic on canvas board, 9"x12"

Had a dream a while back, where I was being chased by lions in a forest. A black hummingbird, whose red skeleton I could see, guided me to safety. 

I've been working on this concept for a couple of weeks, mainly because there aren't too many hummingbird skeleton references out on the internet. Decided to break out the acrylics for this, and it felt nice to try out some new techniques. 

Also included a horrible photo of the gouache study I did and the sketchbook page exploring the idea: